Relinquishing power in the definition of housing qualities : universal design thinking or mere rationalisation?

It is still an open matter whether qualities in housing are the outcome of architects’ artistic ambitions in answer to the users’ needs or whether it is the meticulous realisation of users’ demands and needs that national authorities stipulate. Since 2020, the Swedish building legislation is undergoing a historical change. The Swedish Government has assigned the National Board for Housing, Planning and Building to revise the 30 years praxis for how to write the appurtenant building regulations. These regulations typically present both recommendations and general advice on how to meet a specific requirement, for instance, accessibility and usability for people with disabilities. Instead, the regulations shall refer to new minimum requirements that have been defined as Swedish standards for how the specific building requirements can be achieved. This new model has several similarities with building legislation in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland. However, what is alarming, is that the national authority presume that these standards shall be developed by the building industry itself, rather than as agreements between the building industry and the welfare state what minimum housing qualities are for Swedish housing. Since participation in standardisation also presume a minimum annual fee of approximate 25 000 Swedish crowns per participants, another question materializes, can the building industry act as a representative for a broad and varied group of future users, including people with disabilities